Common counselling: High court reserves order on plea

COUNSELLING FOR MEDICAL ADMISSIONS STARTS

MUMBAI: The Bombay high court on Monday reserved its order on whether deemed universities in the state can conduct their own counselling sessions outside the government mandated National Eligibility Entrance Test (NEET) for admissions to MBBS and BDS courses.

Three of the eight deemed universities in the state that offer MBBS and BDS courses— DY Patil College (Kolhapur and Pune), Krishna Institute of Medical Sciences and Pravara Institute of Medical Sciences— have approached HC, challenging the state government resolution (GR) that makes it mandatory for them to admit students only on the basis of the common entrance test and counselling session under NEET.

As per the GR, once students write the common entrance test which is NEET, a merit list is announced and those who make to the list are required to attend a common counselling session wherein college seats are allotted to them as per their place on the merit list.

While the universities have agreed to the common entrance

test, they have approached HC claiming a right to conduct their own counselling sessions that follow the entrance test.

The rules of the deemed universities require the students who make it to the NEET entrance test merit list to apply individually to each university for their respective counselling sessions, following which, they

might or might not be allotted a seat.

The universities claim that they have a right to conduct their own admissions since they are governed by the statutory powers of the University Grants Commission and the Medical Council of India and hence, the state does not have overriding jurisdiction over them.